


Resilience

by enigmaticdr



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Cancer Arc, F/M, post iwtb
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-06
Updated: 2017-01-06
Packaged: 2018-09-15 03:34:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9216761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/enigmaticdr/pseuds/enigmaticdr
Summary: There is only the sound of the kitchen clock ticking its steady rhythm in quiet staccato beats. Time. She only wishes there was more of it.





	

When Scully is fifty-one, her nose starts bleeding again.

 _It’s just the dry air_ , she tells Mulder, and he very nearly drops his wineglass when she tells him at dinner.

Five months later, the dry air comes to her through an oxygen mask after she passes out at work. When she wakes up, the only thing whiter than the hospital bedsheets is Mulder’s face, pale as a ghost, as he sits beside her and holds her hand, silent.

 _Yes, I took this chip out, years ago,_ her eyes convey. _I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry._

When she’s allowed home, they curl up on their bed. His mouth is on her ear when he whispers, “Let’s go away.”

“Where?”

“The seaside. Let’s rent a cottage for a few days, Scully.”

“Okay,” she agrees, because she’s too tired to argue.

A week later, he makes the reservations, rents a bigger car, and fills out the paperwork while she packs some clothes into a suitcase.

* * *

She has never loved him more. The seaside is beautiful. It is at once raging and calm, so still and yet it rocks her like a long-forgotten lullaby.

She love, love, _loves_ it.

She remembers sitting on the beach with Ahab, leaning into his side with a towel wrapped around her little body as he read to her from Moby Dick. “ _Remember this one, Starbuck: I know not all that may be coming, but be it what it will, I’ll go to it laughing.”_

They eat fresh seafood at a restaurant by the pier, and it is so expensive but so delicious, and she eats her whole pate, for the first time in weeks.

He kisses her afterwards, as they’re walking home, and _yes, Mulder, yes, today is a good day._

It is romantic. It is beautiful and free and she is so happy.

The cottage bed is soft and cool and he opens the wide balcony doors so they can make love under the stars.

She falls asleep listening to the waves rocking against the shore and with the gentle salty breeze whispering through the open window and she is at peace.

* * *

Her throat burns as she heaves her stomach contents into the toilet. There’s black pins in her vision and a ringing in her ears.

 _Thank you_ , she breathes, eyes pressed tightly closed, reveling in the momentary relief that mercifully comes with finally vomiting. _God, thank you_.

She’s been waiting all day to throw up, the side effects of this morning’s chemo getting steadily worse until she considered gagging herself just to get it over with.

For a heavenly ten seconds, her stomach ache is gone. Her headache recedes to a dull pain behind her eyes, and she sags backwards against the door of her shower stall, digging her toes into the plush softness of her bathmat. _Thank you_.

The glass wall is blessedly cool against the side of her cheek.

Now is the time to recuperate, to catch her breath, to be comfortable enough to cry if she wants to. (She won’t.) Now is the time to sit quietly and enjoy the absence of the spinning pinwheel whirling in her head every time she closes her eyes.

With blind fingers, she reaches over and tries to find the flusher, but knocks the toilet paper stand over instead.

“Scully?” he calls from downstairs, voice echoing up the hallway and into the bathroom.

She can’t take in a deep enough breath to muster any response.

She can hear him, climbing the stairs slowly, his slippers tapping gently against the oak floorboards.

“Aw, Scully,” he whispers, coming to crouch in front of her. His hand reaches out and folds itself over her forehead. She closes her eyes and just breathes, leaning the heavy weight of her head into his palm.

It is not romantic. It is ugly and horrid and she is completely, utterly exhausted.

He reaches over above their heads, grabs a glass, and fills a quarter of the way with tap water.

“Here,” he murmurs, crouching in front of her and with a gentle palm to the back of her skull, tips her head forwards so she can sip at the glass of water he’s brought.

He tucks her sweaty hair behind her ears. “There we go,” he whispers. “You’re alright,” he soothes, sliding down the shower door to sit beside her. She wants to reach out and touch him, but her arms are folded tightly around her ribs and for now the ache in her belly is bearable – if she moves, if she even opens her eyes, that relief could be ruined and she will not, in this moment, risk it.

He moves softly against her side and then she hears the water swishing as he flushes the toilet.

“Sorry,” she breathes.

“Don’t be.”

“It’s gross,” she insists, swallowing harshly.

“No,” he answers, tucking her bathrobe more tightly against her chin.

She opens her eyes and turns her head, heavy gaze meeting his. He reaches out and strokes his finger down her cheek, eyes glued to her face.

“Don’t look at me like that, Mulder,” she whispers.

“Like wh-,” he starts, but his throat tightens and steals his voice, cutting off his words like a stone shoved in his windpipe. He swallows harshly, ducks his head down and threads his fingers through his hair.

He stares at the floor. She closes her eyes and stares at the inside of her eyelids.

She reaches out and gently pulls his hand into her lap.

“Be here with me,” she reminds him. Don’t think about it. Just be _here_. With me.

The gentle hiss of the toilet ceases as the tank finally stops filling, and then there is only the sound of the kitchen clock ticking its steady rhythm in quiet staccato beats.

Time. She only wishes there was more of it.

* * *

Two months later, he comes into the bedroom in the middle of the afternoon, holding an envelope.

 “Mulder, what –,” she gingerly lifts her head from the pillow.

“I don’t know,” he says. “I found it on the porch. Someone left it. It’s addressed to you.”

“Open it,” she whispers, and licks her dry lips.

He does. The paper tears easily under his fingers.

His face turns blank with shock, and he is still for so long.

“Mulder,” she murmurs.

He looks up at her and his face melts into a brilliant smile. He reaches out and runs his palm gently over her cheekbone, which protrudes palely from her face.

He holds up a tiny glass vial.

Inside, a microscopic metal chip.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Also posted on tumblr, under enigmaticdr


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